Thanks for that although I don't think it backs up the point I was questioning. Your inital quote confirms the commercial hardball that I never doubted and you

Thanks for that although I don't think it backs up the point I was questioning. Your inital quote confirms the commercial hardball that I never doubted and your later links confirm patent licensing demands against Android manufacturers although which isn't really about an "earlier incarnation [of MS]" and they have been making patent licensing deals with a great number of Android manufacturers so I'm not even sure I'd count it as hardball. Note that I am not a supporter of Microsoft and avoid their products largely because of the commercial hardball they played when they had monopoly power but the original article suggested that they played "legal hardball" with OEMs who wanted to ship devices (I interpreted as PC's) with additional operating systems rather than just MS ones. I had no recollection of this and was looking for a reference before I add it to the list of offences I believe MS to have committed. It is not implausible but it was a new claim and I wanted to understand it. I'm interested in understanding why you think the B&N case is so sad and telling. I haven't investigated the patents claimed but in principle the idea that MS requests fees for using it's patents isn't actually a problem for me.